Independence Days Week 13-14: Bees, Weeds and Survival

Well this post is a bit tardy, but I wanted to share some exciting things from the last couple of weeks. At first I wasn’t going to post anything from the week we were on vacation, because, obviously, we didn’t harvest or plant anything. But then I realized that even though we were across the country, we still made baby steps. So there are a couple of things there from our trip – woohoo!

The first Sunday of the trip, our friends called saying they had a swarm of bees for us! They were so kind and put them into our hive while we were gone. We were sad to miss that, but we are so excited to have bees! And we’re glad we had the hive all set up and waiting!

After we arrived home, we had a TON of weeds to pull. It had rained a few times and we didn’t realize how much weeding we do on the fly. Just everyday picking a few here and there really keeps us on top of them. But when we got back, Rick filled a five gallon bucket at least six times with weeds!

Also, after we arrived home, I was having a discussion with a friend who had recently watched “Escaping Suburbia” and was talking about Peak Oil, becoming self sufficient and all of that. Later that afternoon, as I was walking to the post office, I passed a store called Farris Survival, which up until then, I thought was a camping store. But since I was walking past (instead of driving) I could see that they had rain barrels in there. So I decided to look around.

It is not a camping store. They sell water barrels and water filters and books and bulk beans and grains and grain mills and freeze dried bulk foods, and buckets and Mylar bags and basically everything you would need to survive in the event of apocalypse, government take over, or peak oil except guns. They didn’t have a wooden barrel (I’ve been looking for one to turn into a smoker), but he did have a lot on information. All his grains and beans are organic and sold in 25 plus pound bags. He let H try using the grain mill and sent us home with a big ziplock back full of heirloom red quinoa to try.

Plant something – nothing

Harvest something – eggs, spinach, radishes, weeds galore. Richard was house/dog/chicken/BEE sitting for us, so he did all the egg harvesting. There were two full dozen in the fridge when we got home. And he told us he had made several quiches to take to work and had been eating eggs galore the whole time we were gone.

Preserve something – nothing, however, I bought a few more glass jars (big ones) for the pantry.

Waste Not – compost and recycling, of course, scraps to chickens, etc.

Want Not – bought 6 five pound bags of flour in Tennessee. The price of organic flour there was INSANE! $2.50-$3.50 per bag, while here it can get as high as $7.50. Also, when we got back, the neighbors across the street were having a garage sale, so I bought a big play pen thing with a shade cover – it will be perfect for working at the farm.

Build Community Food Systems – Bob Farris gave us a mess of quinoa. Most of which we’ll eat, but we’re going to plant some as well. And now we know of a good resource for lots of other things!

Eat the Food – tomatoes and corn (Rick found more in the freezer), pork, spinach and radishes, eggs. Peaches in Nashville from the Nashville Farmer’s market. More to write here next week! ;)

Howdy!

From gardens, bees and backyard chickens in the heart of Denver to starting from scratch in San Antonio. Our family of five is striving to find the simple life - the easy way. I spend my free time blogging and getting dirt under my nails along side my hard-working husband. Yay for modern housewifery, urban livestock and front yard gardens!